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Seven Years War Essay example

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The Seven Years War proved to be a crossroads in the history of British colonial rule in America. Britain was victorious, but after defeating her French foes (along with their Indian allies), Britain was left to contemplate the ramifications of a war that would leave her relationship with her American colonies altered forever. This change would eventually lead to conflict between the colonies and Britain, and ultimately the Declaration of American Independence.
In order to understand how the relationship between Britain and the American Colonies became so strained, we must first examine the nature of Britain’s imperial authority. Economic relations between the two entities were …show more content…

Self-reliance was a commodity that was little known in colonial America before the war, and now that the colonists had had a taste of it, they were understandably slow to relinquish it. The seeds of conflict had been planted.
There was another by-product of the war for Britain; her national debt more than doubled during the course of the conflict. At a time when Britain was starting to bend beneath the weight of the debt, it was only a matter of time before parliament looked to the colonies to help shoulder some of the price incurred in their defense. The Sugar and Stamp Acts were the first of many measures to tax the colonists. The Townshend Duties and the Tea Act would follow. While these measures outraged the colonists because of their monetary implications, it was the constitutional implications brought on by the Acts that were most offensive to the colonists. Until after the Seven Years War, the colonists had been left to essentially tax themselves. Now the colonists had a rallying cry, as they deplored the idea of no taxation without representation. In 1765 the Stamp Act Congress was held, and in a bid of utter defiance the representatives agreed that the colonial legislative assemblies alone had the right to tax the colonies. Parliament repealed the Stamp Act, but only after agreeing to pass the Declaratory Act, which informed the colonies that Britain did in fact have the right to legislate for the

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